fantasy

If you have been keeping up with my goodreads account (http://www.goodreads.com/kalliste) you will have noticed I’ve been reading the Harry Potter series, for a really, really, long time. This post may contain spoilers but as I am possibly the only person in the world to only have read it for the first time this year I don’t think that matters.

I’m not sure if the title or sub title gave it away but I wasn’t a huge fan of Harry’s… The supporting characters were more interesting and less worthy of being stabbed in the eye with a fork as far as I’m concerned. One in particular, the wonderfully quirky Snape. I love a villain and even if Snape wasn’t the real big bad I still enjoyed him being an incredible annoyance to Harry. Given the chance, I’d pat Snape on the shoulder and tell him “don’t worry, the boy who lived got nothing on you half blood prince”.

Speaking of the Half Blood Prince, I think it was my favourite of the books with Prisoner of Azkaban a close second. It was a bit darker than the books before it, it gave us more on why Snape is the way he is, it was an insight into Voldemort that we hadn’t seen before and then Dumbledore dies and everyone’s mind = blown.

Oh and Prisoner of Azkaban introduced us to Sirius, enough said.

Least favourite? Goblet of Fire of course. If you’re wondering why it took me 10 months to finish the series, this is your answer. If anyone ever asks me to a Quidditch World Cup, I will give them a hearty “hell no!” because apparently they take more than 100 pages and are possibly the most boring event in the history of man. Until the death eaters start causing some havoc, that is.

Overall it was a good read, if a little long… I don’t think I’ve ever read a series with quite so many pages. I wish it had been less predictable though. Harry is introduced as our good guy in white who learns about his mirror, the dark Voldemort who’s this terrible villainous wizard that everyone is incredibly afraid of. From the get go you automatically expect that Harry will triumph over Voldemort, it’s just a case of finding out how… thousands of pages for it to end up just how you expected it too. I hoped for something more.

That isn’t to say it wasn’t written well, in a world where Twilight is considered well written Young Adult fiction it is good to have something else that stands up against it as an example of what happens when Young Adult fiction is written well. I’d be much happier to have kids/teens brought up in a Harry Potter world of wizards and predictability than a world of sparkling vampires that ruined a genre.

If only Voldemort had ruled supreme though or Harry died and somehow Voldemort was still defeated. Anything would have been better than the obvious.

Plus, if that had happened, we probably would never have had to be subjected to the name Albus Severus Potter.